


Golden Lantern

by skelli



Category: Bakemonogatari
Genre: Canon Rewrite, F/M, suggestive scenes, technically its kizumonogatari and its kiss shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-16
Updated: 2018-05-16
Packaged: 2019-05-07 18:04:19
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14676507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skelli/pseuds/skelli
Summary: A golden God bleeding below society sucking the humanity right from him and changing his life forever. The meeting of Araragi Koyomi and Kiss Shot and how they become entangled as master and servant to lead an inseparable existence delving into supernatural mysteries at the helping hand of Oshino Meme.A rewrite to the opening of the Monogatari Series when Araragi comes upon Kiss Shot in the station and alters his own fate.





	Golden Lantern

**Author's Note:**

> First and foremost I'll say for big plot reasons I don't really like the Monogatari series. I like the ideas, the style, the animation and the writing as well as the imagery. Fantastically done. I think the female characters are written for a purpose rather than as actual characters and thus have almost zero flow between the different series and overall it's a great big fanservice bait show. I'll say that and say I also like the concept, the character of Kiss Shot and I wanted to work with her. It's a self indulgent piece written out of my dissatisfaction for how they use her and for how Araragi is as a character. Not looking to get into a big debate about WHY the writers did what they did. I know and I don't like it. That's why this is here. If you're looking for this, here it is!

Shiftiness was vital to his persona. Shifting the truth, his availability to others, shifting his means of communication, even his eyes. Full transparency would mean having to lay bare his entirety and what was beneath his self-destructive heroistic manhood but perversion and manipulation?

Linearly, if time could be looked at such for a half vampire, it only worsened after he was found by her. Or more accurately it could be said that persona grew stronger, downing the confidence built from the vulnerability of others and his own indestructibility. By the helplessness of situations thought not to have solutions, he pulled in girl by girl, ringing them in gently by the ropes around their throats pulled tight by fate. A hero built by the convenience of others’ misfortune. Would he ever actually cut them free and release them from the teetering edge of the chair he had given them so they wouldn’t be strangled to death?

Not by his own will. 

Araragi Koyomi was that kind of man.

But if, instead of linearly, that time could be seen from the past to the future, with eyes that knew more than just the present and the world’s memories such a tragedy could be averted. Such poor development of an important young man could be prevented, even more so, he could become a proper supernatural mystery assistant. A boy with a future not built on perversion of young ghosts and flimsy morals. 

And there were eyes like such more than available. Standing before a pinnacle moment, Gaen at first watched the flow of allowing such a cowardly boy a taste of power. Ugly, reckless and manipulative. Even his own sisters were not safe from his hand. A vampire’s hand. But if she, who held the hand of God, moved just a pinky in the direction of someone else, someone with far more experience, a true relic of the earth, then what would become of Araragi Koyomi?

Because the world had been angled for him, Kiss Shot was weakened down to her very soul. Would such a relic weep as though she had not known the truest and deepest pains of thousands of realities and cry for him to save her? Such an unfathomable act would only work if the universe had centered itself. What timeless God of rage, carnal greed, power, knowledge, would beg at the sight of one pathetic, sweat coated human?

Unbelievable. Gaen had to agree to such. Removing such a lens only opened up the possibilities of Araragi dying. But who was to say that it was wrong for him to die? Reform or death was the new reality. 

So when he walked beneath the surface of the city, feeling the aching in his chest, the pulsing that he was about to be before a great power, one so much larger than himself, it all shifted. Towards a woman. 

Burning heat under his skin bringing his legs to a weakness akin to fatigue. He slowed, gripping his shirt with heavy fingers. What was happening? His heartbeat was so loud in his ears, he felt he might go deaf with the sound. A blur of red at the edges of his gaze swirling into his vision brought him to a stumble against the wall. Like bit by bit Araragi was becoming boneless, he slipped down to the dirty station floor, hand skipping along the stone walls. The blood trail gleamed at him. 

Why couldn’t he catch his breath? Thoughts were falling from him, water droplets down into the deep, bottomless sink. Someone was calling him. Lifting heavy eyelids, pupils deep and dark and reflective, he pulled his head up. 

Someone was calling him. 

A line of sweat came down and caught at his jawline when he rose back to shaking legs. Using the wall as support, he moved slowly towards the stairs down deeper into the belly of the underground. Each stair proved he was coming before a God and at the face of God what was the mirroring image that was humanity if not a vessel?

How could such a fragile and simple being become a master? Memories he hadn’t yet created rippled into his mind’s eyes. Memories of the future he would have had, standing before Shinobu, before Senjougahara, before Hanekawa. Fear coiled in his gut and he curled up on one stair, gripping the handrail and shivering. Memories that were just between the two realities, one fueled by the all seeing eyes of Gods. 

Shinobu’s sharp smile and cat-like eyes narrowed in her assertion of power. Where was this? His eyes were full of an expression he used to find cute and charming that now only made him want to lower his head. His bedroom, he _had_ lowered his head and now was kneeling close to the floor he knew very well. 

She folded her legs, flashing movement in his peripheral and making him glance up. 

“You stink of fear.” She commented, the white of her dress speckled with red at the lace edges. “Is it because you feel you will be swallowed up, my master?” The last words were said with such harshness, such raw power he almost threw up.

His vision swam, the weight of her gaze pushing him down and down until his forehead pressed against the floor. Brazenly his cheeks inflamed, honest unlike him.

Coming to, Araragi lifted his head, neck weak. He was back in the station. Trembling, he let loose a breath he hadn’t realized he had been holding tight to his chest (as if he was afraid it was going to be taken from him.)

The final step came with such relief, he collapsed and slapped both his palms on the cold floor. Breathing against the heavy air he watched behind the darkness of his physical body memories being altered, being taken hold of. 

Shinobu coming forth from his shadow, sucking the very soul from him and as she stood, he fell just as he had at the bottom of the stairs. Her form above him, the pressure sinking him into the very ground he sat on, palms being pressed into the dirt. Eyes burned him, wide and challenging. He couldn’t look back. He just couldn’t. 

“Did you think of me as weak?” This voice was not just the voice of the child’s body she resided in. There was something below it, waiting. 

A little bit of blood trickled down Araragi’s chin and belatedly he reached up and touched it. He had bitten his lip. Pressing his finger to his mouth he licked the red. Who was Araragi Koyomi? Who was the body he inhabited in those memories? Did he know something that now he didn’t? 

Standing once more, he teetered to one side but managed to catch himself. Swaying he walked further, finding himself at a final set of stairs. What would change his fate forever was waiting for him at the bottom. Little did he understand it had all been changed already and he should never make a God wait. 

Throwing himself to the floor under the false lights of the platform, he bruised both knees and hoped, still deeply weak in his soul, not to be consumed and killed by the power before him. Shimmering gold and beneath his hands was the smear of blood, sweet and rich. The escalators buzzed behind him.

He pressed his palms through the life force, knowing he was feeling true power and breathed out. The entire room was fragrant and he flushed, hot under his collar and at his cheeks. 

“You are an entitled thing.” A voice spoke, echoing deep into the tunnels and deep within him. It ripped from his the foundation that had been Araragi before; a shallow perversion, entitled to the femininity of guardless pretty women. He lowered his head to the red, painting his forehead and bangs with her color. Breathless and weak. 

“Come here and feed me. I will let you save me.” 

Eyelashes flicking blood as Araragi opened his eyes, he finally had the sense it was alright to raise his gaze. Across the floor lay the body of a woman, a strike of bold red in the pale white of the room. Her torn dress, jagged like teeth fell across the flesh of skin cut cleanly at each limb. Raw bone and muscles seeping her life into the red sea. But her gaze, gold and unyielding and nothing like the eyes of past memories, past Araragi’s minds burned into him. He gasped, unable to tear his own eyes away and caught fire at his core. A train blew past them, flashing lights over and over across both their bodies.

Panting, Araragi found the strength to stand and he came forward, blood falling from him. The pull of a God was not something easily overcome. And rather who would want to tell a God they felt more worthy for anything other than what they had been chosen for?

Her eyes were unblinking on him, challenging the actions of a neighboring Araragi to rear its head here in this plane. Eyelids heavy, mind simply a fog of reds and pale pinks he came to her side and dropped back to his knees which were soaked with her. 

And he loved her. For she was greater than even he could ever imagine becoming. No matter which line of fate they followed it all led to one relic of the world who had given him her flesh and blood. But for Gods, time was irrelevant and he would need to give back. Especially for keeping her selfishly as a prisoner at his own cowardice. 

When the other Araragi had reacted in foolish logic and denied the rule of the divine standing as if human, this Araragi knew of a duty he had been given when he had chosen to answer the voice. Tugging open the collar of his shirt, the color of his dark eyes barely visible past the arousal of simply being before power, he offered his throat. 

A curl of approval at the canines. That pulsed deeply within him, in his guts and slowly, because his body was heavy with pleasure, he breathed out from his nose. Whether he was willing to die, and in both planes he had been, he would not perish and vanish from the earth. 

Rather he would be reborn. Although this was true in both cases as well. 

When he leaned down to her, their eyes met, prey to predator and he shied away, turning his gaze to her teeth. Echoing between them, Araragi’s heartbeat extracted both fangs and he moved his head down for her access. 

The vampire’s bite was bliss, a euphoric rush starting with the sharpest prick of pain. The sting of two bees. Poison rushed the wound and what orgasm he had known paled at the explosion behind his eyes and at his throat. A full body experience, one that curled his toes and flushed his cheeks. One that brought him whispering sweet words of nothing to no one in particular but the sensation. 

Bubbling beside him the feeding was already regenerating her strength and her limbs crackled. One hand, still merely the bones of shape, pinkened with the slow grow of the fleshes, came up and took hold of his nape. Like animal to animal, he lay limp in her hold knowing that with even just the skeleton of her form she could crush his throat like a toothpick. 

And in the rush of pleasures, that was even a little exciting. 

Now they had exchanged positions. Her limbs were buzzing but available and she held him in still naked arms, the loss of blood taking him at the knees and hips. But he wouldn’t ask her to stop and in his human greed, he would even long for more. 

His back against the cold floor still wet with her blood. His master, his creator above him with her lips wet with his life. The lights hidden by her golden image, bold and powerful and uncaring for man-made darkness repellent. Araragi, lying beneath her, was enthralled but even the most affectionate words could not suffice to how he felt to be reborn by such strength. 

Yet he was still learning and between them, he shifted his thighs back and forth, looking for the familiar form of something that accompanied great arousal. 

All seeing, she rose to both her knees, the bones creaking without their flesh to smooth the movements. A halo against her hair. 

“You can’t get hard without blood. Who’s going to be penetrating who, you perverted little thing.”

She glimmered and smeared in his vision, bleeding with the lights as if ascending and he offered a thin, maybe even sheepish smile. Rough, cold bones pushed the bangs from his face, putting him under the examining eye fully. Heaviness clung underneath his eyes, darkened with his blood loss. 

“Worthy of my blood.” She stood, the pull of gravity hiding the regeneration beneath her dress. “Come.” The sound of her feet echoed in the tunnels, vanishing off into the distance. 

Sluggish, barely on the brink of consciousness, Araragi rolled over and looked from under his lids to her retreating form. But somewhere he found the strength to stand and stumbled after her knowing she would not go more than just out of sight. 

And that was when they met Oshino. The relationship came forward differently and one with Oshino being far less available for consultation. But his role for Araragi was to convince him to take action with the supernatural whether he appeared as a neutral party in the same situation or not. Now he would have no need for explanations deluded in Araragi’s ‘good nature’ and ‘willingness to be helpful.’ Or in his ‘you made this choice now stick with it.’ 

They would all sit as a division led now not by the role of the ignorant but helpful older brother act by Araragi but instead by the hand of God. Oshino knew of two sides as well. He had sided as openly as possible in the alternate and this time would be no different. There was the side of the vampire and the side against the vampire. Kiss Shot would send Araragi back onto the battlefield. 

They discussed this hidden in the abandoned school Oshino (a classic for him). Rather than the need to convince leading their purpose, it was strategy that held the conversation although Araragi was a floating on a dream-like consciousness and barely present. A hand sat on his head, his face pressed against the rippling muscles of Kiss Shot’s thigh as she sat in one of the school desks. Regal and yet adaptable. Her missing limbs left the regeneration something left to be desired. Whether there should be shame in his state, it went over Araragi’s head. They were in the midst of the unbelievable and he had been chosen. What he would have known as his masculinity and dignity had been greatly altered at Kiss Shot’s presence. 

Masculinity was but a front for society in his ample dominance. 

When it came to his actual briefing on how he was to defeat Episode, Guillotinecutter and Dramaturgy he was sat in a chair like in some alternate universe’s class and given a briefing. Body burning with poison, he felt his eyes might cave back into his skull as he listened. The rebirthing of his body was not one he was going to enjoy simply in terms of physical limitations.

But he would soon overcome those. Panting, the voice echoing in every fiber of his body, “Endure, endure, endure.” Coldness like the waters of the Antarctic gripping his lungs and bleeding them raw. Fingers clawing down red, red, red to rest at the pink, bare feet of his own. With the blood he expelled, she licked his face and nibbled his bottom lip, tasting his death. 

Fighting with just the knowledge of his master depending on him made him a little reckless but not suicidal. There was no need to overly involve Hanekawa and put her in danger and even then he was past the simple space of admiring the weight of her chest and longing to have a flirting, casual relationship with her.

Each limb retrieved was as if a piece of himself he had never known had suddenly come into the light. Relief, a weightless happiness and the aching of dead hearts connected. They shared privacy that was not quite as private as it may have seemed. Several pairs of eyes watching the growth of a relationship Araragi would die for. He kissed the flesh of her legs, her now strong thighs and between her legs, his own peeking out from beneath the red of a dress stained with life.

The death of a woman for his development went unnecessary and Hanekawa was safe to continue her everyday. Pulling her in with vampiric charms was something he no longer thought of doing, even subconsciously. She was free to be just a polite and caring student in his class. (And soon a member of the supernatural cases they would solve.)

When Kiss Shot’s full power had been restored he was moved to almost tears. Beauty beyond his still human-level comprehension. He was touched greatly at her loving kisses to his cheeks and wept for her and for himself. Even the alternate Araragi’s could cry for another so his emotions at display were not a wild occurrence. The reasoning was one from true selflessness though; he had achieved his altruism. 

He did not fight his master for he had been given fangs to be at her service not to steal her power. Oshino seemed interested and the very least was involved to a degree he could not just slip away at the end of their battles. Whatever higher power ruled him, if there was one systematically, allowed him the city. What could be learned, seen was plentiful _if_ Kiss Shot was to choose to stay. 

Both parties would benefit. Oshino would create the space for her to coexist once more with human society and she would bring him work, knowledge. The supernatural was drawn to her greatness and she seemed fine with letting them in close. A kind, benevolent God. 

For heartless was she not. From her servant, his life was not to be fully overcome. They could share their lives, mingle them together and bring Kiss Shot’s name back into the light, figuratively speaking. The power of being a false and true God was that with the speaking of her name, the acknowledgement of her presence, she would only grow. He would be a lantern to lead those in the dark towards her golden sun. Not a savior but a deliverer. 

Her teeth on his throat was enough of a pleasure. Even at his halfling daylight existence, he could not quite get the bruising fang holes to heal so he took to bandaging them. With Araragi returning as guide, Ougi was born. Not as a separate self, one full of intelligent chaos. Ougi was born as himself, an Araragi who was sitting in a classroom full of humans as an imposter. He held no actual danger to his classmates, nor to even the supernatural deities he was to meet, but he was not harmless. 

Back to school and yet somehow like fog, distant, known but ungraspable, he would also coexist, see his family, make contracts.

Hanekawa, who was a class rep and a kind, thoughtful student, would still reach out to him. 

“You’re looking pale, Araragi-kun.”

A pretty crafted smile, like a wall of an expression. Of course he wouldn’t flash his teeth anymore. A smile docile and pleasant. He was not looking to manipulate her but instead play with the cat whose eyes burned out from inside her heart. 

“Can we meet after school? I have something to talk to you about.” 

His shadow would ripple against hers, dodging a swipe from a cat’s paw.


End file.
